The CDC confirmed this week that 62 people, mainly children, have come down with acute flaccid myelitis (AFM), an illness that weakens their arms and legs. But even though the symptoms are scary (they’ve been described as “polio-like,”) it’s a very rare disease and I promise you there’s no need to freak out. Doctors and scientists are still figuring out exactly what’s going on. Here are the facts we have right now: How do we know these kids don’t have actual polio? Because there’s a test for polio, and the CDC says everyone with AFM has, so far, tested negative for it. What is polio, anyway? Until the 1950s, when the first polio vaccines became available, polioviruses were fairly common in water and occasionally caused gastrointestinal symptoms (diarrhea and such). A small percentage of people who were infected with the poliovirus went on to develop serious complications including paralysis. If you’ve seen images of kids in black-and-white pictures wearing braces on their legs or sleeping in iron lungs, that’s polio. Polio itself is rare today. There have only been a few dozen cases worldwide this year—some from the virus itself, and some from the vaccine, which is a whole nother… Read full this story
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